Optimism is a Layer 2 scaling solution on Ethereum to reduce gas fees, speed up transaction completion, thereby providing a smoother user experience while maintaining security from the Ethereum original chain. Optimism belongs to the Optimistic Rollup segment, using a fraud proof security mechanism.
Simply put, your transaction will be considered valid and approved if it cannot be proven fraudulent.
The name “Rollup” comes from splitting transactions off the main chain, then wrapping them in a single batch and creating proof, then uploading it to Layer 1, imagining transactions being rolled up. More specifically, Optimism is a layer 2 consisting of 3 main components:
Ethereum mainnet: Optimism's Layer 1 native security platform.
Optimistic Rollup: The core of Optimism's scalability.
Optimistic Virtual Machine (OVM): A virtual machine compatible with Ethereum, helping projects work like they are on L1 Ethereum. This is the environment to run Ethereum's smart contracts, so OVM can be considered as an EVM with much better scalability, helping to process a large number of smart contracts at the same time.
Highlights of Optimism
With the above characteristics, Optimism's Blockchain has notable points including:
Transaction Experience: With fast processing speed, gas fees are being reduced by 88 times compared to gas on Ethereum currently.
Convenient for DApp Scaling, Scaling, and Deployment: Fully supporting EVM, Ethereum dapps or DApps in other EVM-compatible ecosystems can be run on layer 2 with just a few lines of code.
Security: Layer 2 still inherits the strict security level of Layer 1 Ethereum.
Highlights of Optimism:
Total number of wallet addresses: 329,000
Average number of transactions per day: 53,684
Gas fee for sending ETH: $0.45
Gas swap on DEX: $0.88
NFT gas fee: $0.89
There are currently 108 projects active on Optimism
Total TVL of the whole system reached 640 million USD. Ranked 3rd according to the TVL rating of Layer 2 on Ethereum.
Recently, to thank the early users, Optimism announced the launch of OP token and airdrop this token for early users. Details about this token and airdrop will be presented in the next section.
In addition, last March, Optimism also announced the close of a $150 million Series B funding round at a valuation of $1.65 billion. This funding round is led by two famous names, a16z and Paradigm. Prior to that, the Series A round of $25 million was also led by a16z.
In the latest version, Optimism has introduced Optimism Collective (roughly translated: Optimism Community). Optimism Collective is a large-scale DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) of digitally democratic governance, built to promote the rapid and sustainable development of a decentralized ecosystem. central. Going forward, the governance of Optimism will be a partnership between the Optimism Foundation and members of the Optimism Collective.
Similar to the structure of Congress, the Optimism Collective will be governed by two houses: the Citizen's House and the Token House.
Token House: Founded when Airdrop #1 was launched, empowering the first people to do active community activities to participate in voting protocol updates, choose projects to receive incentives,... Tokens are here is OP.
Citizen's House: The main purpose is to facilitate and manage the process of distributing and sponsoring useful products for the community (public goods), deciding the amount of money to be distributed to projects and community building products for the benefit of the community. common interest. Citizenship here shall be conferred by non-transferable NFTs. Details about Citizen House will be revealed in the future.
From the ideas above, the OP's economy would have the following flywheel:
Demand for OP Blockspace: Funding for the OP economy will come from the Optimism network and its block space value. The right to participate in block space provides a sustainable source of revenue.
Sequencer generates revenues: Sequencer is a node that acts as a processor of transactions on L2 and sends them to L1. With the same role as miners, the sequencer will receive a portion of the revenue as transaction fees.
RetroPGF: Revenue from the sequencer will be reallocated to the community through Retroactive Public Good Funding. It can be understood as funding, awarding money to individuals, projects, communities, having products with good impact or making contributions to the general community. Citizen's House members will vote on the allocation of this capital.
Value for Builders and Users:
Users: Will often receive airdrops from OP, from projects that receive incentives funded by the OP ecosystem and the Retro program.
Builder: Receive rewards directly from the Retroactive program, projects that receive rewards from the Retroactive program will help other projects have the tools, applications, and infrastructure to build their projects.